


Curiouser and Curiouser

by beeeinyourbonnet



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: BAMF Belle, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-16
Updated: 2013-06-12
Packaged: 2017-12-08 15:51:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/763182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beeeinyourbonnet/pseuds/beeeinyourbonnet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Belle goes on the adventure she's always dreamed of.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> And Bee ignores all canon timelines in favor of making her own.  
> 

The leather bindings of the book were distressed and cracking at the spine. It had once been a deep cherry, but had faded to mottled, dusty brown years before Belle ever found it. The gold lettering and filigree on the cover had been flaking off for decades, and all that remained of the title was one stubborn “L.” Belle clutched it to her chest like a sick child.

Going on an adventure was a lot more like going on an extended camping trip than Belle had been expecting. Ever since she’d left Avonlea, her days were spent walking and her nights were spent in seedy inns, where she hardly slept for fear of being attacked. She wanted to go back home, to recoup and maybe plan a bit better, but she knew she would never hear the end if she returned after only a week, even if she intended to leave again.

The sun was at its highest, bearing down on her leather vest like an angry dragon when Belle decided it was time to stop for lunch. The forest was beautiful at this time of day, with the trees managing to block out the worst of the sun’s heat, and she found one by a patch of purple wildflowers that curved in just the right places for her back. She tucked herself against it, propping her book on her knees so that she could cover it with a napkin and use it as a makeshift table.

If she’d thought to bring a horse, this whole journey would have been much easier. On foot, she paused often, upset that her legs had not forgotten what it was like to be a relatively sedentary princess. All her life, she’d wanted to move, move, move, and she’d never dreamed that something on her own body would try to hold her back.

To pass the time while her feet rested, she had taken up whittling. She had read a book on it once, and while it wasn’t one of the three books she’d brought, she remembered the basics. Since a dagger was her only weapon, it seemed a reasonable activity. Without the book, she couldn’t make a shape, so she had made a long, sharpened stick that she was calling a spear. Gaston would have laughed at her if she’d shown him, but she wasn’t marrying him anymore, so that didn’t matter.

It would at least suffice if a man decided that her body was his, just because she was a woman in an inn alone. It may have been crude, but it was still sharp and heavy. She would skewer someone if she had to.

“Shoot.” She looked down at her finger where she’d nicked herself with her dagger. It was a tiny cut, but the blood was already beading up and trickling down her skin, and she didn’t want to get any dirt in it. There was a stream nearby, so she packed up her tablecloth and dagger, and started toward it, making an effort not to absently stick her dirty finger into her mouth.

The roar that ripped out across the forest was still loud, even over the sound of the rushing stream, and Belle paused mid-dip. Whatever made that noise had to be huge, but she didn’t want to overreact and end up hurting herself. She listened until she heard another roar, determining that she could hear no other beastly noises, so it must have been far off.

Satisfied, she stuck her hand in the stream, letting it wash the blood and dirt away. As an afterthought, she splashed some water on her face, rubbing her eyes with it. If she was going to start moving, she was going to have to be awake.

Reluctant to do so, she stuck her book in her pack before moving on. An ancient tale of adventure, she liked to hold onto it while she walked. The feel of it gave her comfort, and she had read it so many times that she could pull quotes out at random to keep her motivated.

Her plan was to walk in the opposite direction of the roar, even if this meant backtracking, but it was just as she started for the thicket of trees that she heard the scream.

“Shit,” she said, because this was a situation that called for cursing. With hardly a thought, she turned on the toes of her leather boots and headed straight for the danger. When she’d told Gaston that she planned to adventure, this was what he’d laughed at the most.

“Belle,” he’d said, shaking his head between snickers, “you have no sense of self-preservation. When the ogres came, you wanted to head straight into battle. I’ll be surprised if you make it a week on your own.”

Well, it had been almost a week. If she survived this beast encounter—and she had to believe that she would—then she could send a letter to Gaston and rub her survival in his face.

The beast was easy to track, because it echoed every scream with a roar of its own, and when she felt like she might go deaf from the volume, she knew she was close. Then, it was in front of her—a roaring behemoth of black scales and silver claws. It wasn’t quite a dragon—too small, and not breathing fire—but it was close, and Belle hoped she could save the screamer without having to go anywhere near it. She wanted to be brave, of course, but she wasn’t stupid. She would give Gaston no reason to laugh at her.

Hiding behind a tree off to its left, she watched it, trying to find something that would indicate where the screamer was. She hoped the beast hadn’t eaten her while Belle was running.

When the beast unfurled its wings to reveal its arms, Belle knew where the screaming was coming from. A small blonde girl was clutched in its claws, and another scream tore from her tiny throat. Without thinking, Belle rushed forward with the homemade spear as her only weapon.

“Let her go!” she yelled, and she didn’t know whether she expected the beast to listen to her or not. She waved her stick at it, feeling smaller than she had ever felt in her life, and it paused what it was doing to watch her. It must not be used to tiny women brandishing wood. Maybe Belle would have the advantage of surprise.

“Oh, please, save me!” the little girl wailed, flailing her arms and kicking her legs. Belle’s chest clenched—she couldn’t have been more than ten.

There was no way she could kill the thing with her stick. Its scales were too thick, and her stick wasn’t sharp enough. Her best plan was to get it to drop the girl, and hope she landed on her feet fast enough for Belle to smuggle her away.

Things like this happened in her book all the time, and she tried to dredge up some nugget of wisdom. The best she could come up with was the hero punching a shark in the nose to get it to drop a mermaid, but the beast’s nose was about five feet above her hand, it would probably bite her arm off if she did that.

It was her only plan, though, and the little girl’s sobs were making her want to cry in sympathy, so she had to do something. Steeling herself, she stomped up to the beast and yelled. When it lowered its head to bite at her, she skittered backwards and bonked it firmly on the snout with her stick.

It reeled, letting out a shriek of rage, but it dropped the girl.

“Run!” Belle shouted, and the girl didn’t need telling twice. She headed for the trees, leaving Belle alone with the behemoth—the angry behemoth.

“No one ever lost their head by ducking,” she recited to herself as the beast swiped a mammoth claw at her and she threw herself to the ground. She wished that her book had as much specific beast killing advice as it did beast-avoiding advice, but the hero never seemed to have trouble when it came down to the actual slaying.

It swiped a few more times before it realized that she was flat, and she scrambled up before it could think to step on her.

“Think, Belle,” she hissed, darting backwards while it flapped its wings like it was winding up a music box.

She thought back on every book she’d ever read, running this way and that to avoid the beast. It was a blessing that it was too big to be fast, or else Belle would definitely be a pile of blood, skin, and crushed bones.

“The Cyclops!” she shouted, throwing her hand in the air as the idea struck. The beast roared, giving her time to back away. Someday, when she went back to Avonlea to tell everyone how awesome she was, she was going to lecture her father on the flaws of never letting his daughter into weapons drills. If he had, she might have been better at aiming.

There was no time like the present to start learning new skills, though, and she had to make sure that this skill happened perfectly. She had one shot—otherwise, she was just going to have to run and hope that she made it out of the forest alive.

“Hey!” she yelled, trying to direct its face to her. She poised her spear, praying that it was sharp enough. “Hey, you!”

She tried to make herself look as nonthreatening as possible while pointing a sharp object at its face. It came toward her like a snake stalking a rabbit. Were she sure of her speed and the sharpness of her spear, she’d have waited until it was up close and personal to plunge it into its forehead. Instead, she had to hope that momentum gave the spear more force on impact.

“Please hit,” she whispered. “Please oh please oh please oh please—” She let the spear fly with her breath, and then stood still long enough to see that it struck the beast’s left eye. Before it could roar in surprise, she bolted for the cover of the forest.

To her surprise, the little girl was waiting for her, hidden in a bush. She almost screamed at the sight of her, but kept the presence of mind not to alert the behemoth to the fact that she’d stopped. She could hear it thrashing and raging, crushing twigs and branches in the wake of its pain.

The girl was wide-eyed, and Belle wasn’t sure why she hadn’t moved, but they needed to now. Beckoning her, Belle started forward, tiptoeing as best she could while also running for her life. When the thrashing sounds grew muffled, and Belle swore she could hear the pounding of her heart over the beast’s roars, she allowed herself to break into a full run.

“I think—I think we lost it!” the girl said, sounding like she might collapse if they ran any further.

Belle slowed until she felt she could stop, and then turned around to give the girl a good look. She was a little wisp of a person, with her tiny frame wrapped in a blue cotton dress that was now smudged with dirt and torn. Her hair was held back from her face by a black ribbon, revealing eyes as bright blue as Belle’s own. If it weren’t for the blonde locks, they could have been sisters.

They watched each other, and then the little girl ducked into a curtsy. “Thank you for saving me.”

Belle returned the gesture, though it felt odd without a skirt. “There’s no need to thank me. I’ve always dreamed of slaying a beast.” In her dreams, she’d had a sword, but that was irrelevant. “I’m Belle. Do you live near here?”

The little girl shook her head. “I did, but then the jabberwocky came and destroyed my home. And I’m Alice. Alice Liddell.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Belle day of Rumbelle Week. :D

The first question Alice asked when they had sat to rest and clean up by a stream was, “Why are you wearing pants?” It was shortly followed by, “Are you poor?” and both questions made Belle question her decision not to find a town in which to drop Alice off.

Every time she thought about it, though, her heart pinched, and she knew she never could. Alice was more lost than she was, having no one and nothing to turn to. Belle was the closest thing to family the girl had now, though they’d only known each other for a few hours.

The good thing about having Alice around was that it gave Belle’s adventure direction. Now that she had a person to care for, she had concrete things to be doing, and her first order of business was to find something for Alice to wear, and then convince her to actually wear it. The girl had a curiosity to rival Belle’s own, and Belle hoped that this would incline her to wearing pants just for the novelty of it.

“But pants are for men,” Alice said, wrinkling her nose when Belle presented the idea.

“Pants are for anyone who chooses to wear them. They’re quite comfortable.” She plucked at her own brown leather breeches, which fit like a softer second skin.

“Anything that a man can do in pants, I can do in a dress.” She stuck her pointy nose in the air, and Belle pressed her lips together to keep from laughing.

“It’s a little difficult to slay beasts in dresses.”

“You’re the one who slays beasts.”

Belle snorted. “Not anymore. I lost my spear.”

That fact brought a new set of problems to the forefront of Belle’s mind. It was all well and good to say that she wasn’t going to slay anymore beasts, but what if another beast found her? It wasn’t like she’d gone looking for the first one, and if the situation repeated itself, she would end up being a sacrifice for whoever she was saving.

This train of thought led Belle and a protesting Alice to the blacksmith of a small town in the middle of sheep country.

“If we’re to be adventurers, we need weapons,” she said, firm.

Alice tilted her head in thought. “I suppose. We can have jewels put on them as we travel. Are we really adventurers, Belle?”

“Well—we’re adventuring, aren’t we?”

This renewed Alice’s spirit, and soon Belle was jogging after her toward the smithy. When they shoved the heavy door open, they found a hairy older man and his young apprentice, who was too young for Belle, but much too old for Alice, and Belle thought she could see disappointment floating across her companion’s features as she realized this for herself.

“The seamstress is across the road,” the younger man said. He sounded polite enough, but Belle had been taking snide comments like that her entire life, and she almost bared her teeth.

“Actually, we’re here to buy swords. Two of them.”

“Wait, Belle.” Alice tugged her sleeve. “I want a dagger instead.”

“All right, one sword and one dagger.” She looked him squarely in the eyes, having to tilt her head almost all the way back to do so.

“Getting gifts?”

“No, they’re for us.”

“We’re adventurers,” Alice added, pointing her nose up as well.

“That right?” The hairy man lumbered forward, and the way he looked at Alice made Belle sure that he had daughters. He reminded her of her own father—though considerably larger, hairier, and sweatier.

“Yes. Belle slew the jabberwocky.”

Both men whistled, and Belle relaxed. Even the older one seemed impressed.

“And you didn’t have a sword?” the younger asked.

Belle shook her head. “I had a spear, but now all I have is the knife I use to whittle, and I don’t think it’d be a very effective weapon.”

They whistled again, and Belle blushed. These were far better than the whistles and catcalls she was used to receiving from the soldiers—these men didn’t care about the tightness of her bodice, or the height of her neckline.

“Well, for such a fine little lady, I think we can manage a dagger for free, don’t you?” The older man looked at the younger one, who nodded.

“If—if it’s all right, could you teach us how to forge?” Belle asked, hoping she wasn’t pushing her luck.

The older man let out a meaty guffaw. “Well, aren’t you something? All right, we can start first thing in the morning—I’m going to have to charge you for your sword, though, you know.”

“Yes, of course.” Belle nodded, trying to contain her excitement so as not to scare either of the men away. “I can pay.”

“Do you girls have a place to stay?”

Belle and Alice looked at each other, then shook their heads.

“My mam runs a boarding house,” the boy said. “We’ll put you up for the night, in exchange for a little help.”

“Help?” Alice said, wrinkling her nose, but Belle was quick to smile and say, “Thank you. That would be perfect.”

* * *

 

Belle and Alice were at the smithy an hour after sunrise, following the young apprentice on his way to work. By nightfall, they had swords cooling on his rack, and Belle was exhausted. She and Alice had split the work on her dagger, melting the metal and pouring it into a mold, then hammering it into shape until the blacksmith had to come and adjust it because they weren’t yet master craftswomen.

The finished products may not have been as nice as the other swords hanging in the shop, but Belle thought her sword was beautiful, and she hoped that she wouldn’t have to throw it at a jabberwocky and run.

After one more night in the boarding house, Belle and Alice were forced to move on. It was a nice place, this sheep-herding village, but Belle sought adventure, and was growing restless.

“Where will you go next?” the young apprentice had asked, looking wistful as they bade their farewells.

“Wherever the wind takes us,” Belle had said.

It had been an hour, and Alice was no longer satisfied with this answer.

“What if we get hungry? We had a destination last time. Maybe we should get horses, or find a town with a beast problem and slay it for them.”

“Alice, it’s not like we have a way of seeing all the towns in front of us right now. We won’t hear of any news like that until we find a big city. Really, what we need is a—”

“Oi, you big bastard, get away from my—!”

Belle looked down at Alice, who was as wide-eyed as Belle was at hearing the bodiless male voice.

“Is he talking to us?” Alice whispered.

“I hope not.” Drawing her sword, Belle inched forward.

“My hat! Give it back, you big lug!”

Belle straightened up and started forward. “Definitely not to us. I think you may have found a beast, Alice!”

“Oh, goody! I do hope it’s a bit smaller than the jabberwocky.”

“It seems to be some sort of hat-thief.”

A crash that sounded like a tree snapping in half gave them direction, and they both ran toward the sound. A man stood in a clearing, wielding only a butter knife at an ogre carrying a large top hat.

“Stay back!” the man said, eyes darting toward them. “Ogres are tricky.”

“We’re beast slayers!” Alice said, beaming up at the man.

The ogre roared, and Belle immediately put herself between it and Alice. “Alice! Don’t say that in front of a beast!”

“Oh. Sorry.”

Belle brandished her sword while the ogre roared, having no idea what to do when confronted with one. The ogre wars had happened while she was all but locked in her tower, and no one had given her any helpful ogre-fighting tips.

“Excuse me? Sir?” she tried. Perhaps it could understand her—the man had been yelling at it conversationally enough. “I don’t want to kill you, so maybe we could just sit down and—and chat. Reasonably. Also, if you could give my friend back his hat, that would be wonderful, as it seems like it might be quite important to him.”

The ogre roared again, and the man without the hat chuckled. “Oh, aren’t you a precious little flower. Dear ogre, sir! Please, if we could converse a moment!” He swept his hand out and sunk into a bow while Belle stood there in front of Alice, wielding a sword in shaking hands.

“I’m trying to save your life, okay?” she said, eyes on the ogre.

“All we have to do is cut its head off,” the man said.

“Oh, that’s all, is it?” Belle wrinkled her nose.

“Should be a piece of cake now that one of us has a sword. I’ll get him low to the ground, and you swipe.”

Belle nodded, though she was not actually sure that she liked this plan. The ogre looked far too human for comfort, and she didn’t know if she wanted to behead a humanoid, especially not in front of Alice. It didn’t seem that she had a choice, though, because it was either behead or be beheaded as the ogre reached down for her.

“You there! Catch me if you can!” the man yelled, and he must have been mad to be so cheerful about an ogre about-facing and lumbering after him.

Belle and Alice ran after, sword and dagger poised for action. The man ran the ogre through the clearing and into the forest, taking it in the path of debris, and it was only when the ogre stumbled that Belle realized he was trying to trip it.

“Alice, go on the other side and confuse the ogre! I’ll run behind you with the sword.”

Alice nodded, and took up residence on the left. When the man realized what she was doing, he grinned.

“We make a good team, huh, ladies?”

“It’ll be even better if this works,” Belle yelled, hoping her adrenaline would keep her going long enough to save everyone’s life.

The forest was thin now, and the ogre was getting tired. Belle made a split decision, and added herself into the mix.

“Sir! Over here, sir!”

The man snorted again, but the ogre turned too quickly, lost his balance, and toppled over. They all skidded to a stop, watching it lie still.

“Do I really have to kill it?” Belle asked, resting her hands on her thighs while she heaved out breaths. “It looks so peace—”

The ogre roared and lunged for them all.

“Kill it!” Alice shrieked, and Belle was glad that the girl turned away as she darted forward to sever its head. The ogre’s body twitched for a minute, then went limp, and the man danced over to its hands to grab his hat.

“You ladies are by far the most skilled warriors I have ever seen,” the man said.

Belle and Alice were too busy staring at the headless corpse to respond, and seconds later Belle felt bile rising in her throat and she had to disappear into the bushes to vomit. Alice joined her seconds later.

“Does this make us weak?” she asked, voice tiny and more like a little girl than Belle had ever heard.

“No, Alice. It makes us humane. I only killed him because I had to—we should never get joy from killing anything, even beasts.”

Alice nodded, wiping her wet eyes, then pressed herself into Belle’s side.

“My name is Jefferson!”

They both turned at the sound of the man picking his way through the trees, hat atop his shaggy head.

“It’s very nice to meet you, Jefferson. I’m Belle.”

“And I’m Alice Liddell. We’re adventurers.”

“You are indeed,” Jefferson said, smiling down at her. “And now, you must be tired adventurers, who smell ripe. Come back with me, and let me thank you with tea.”

Belle and Alice exchanged looks. Under normal circumstances, she might not have trusted him and his tea, but there were certain bonds that couldn’t be broken, and fighting an ogre with someone was one of them.

“Yes, thank you. That would be lovely.”


End file.
